GP surgeries have been told to prepare for seeing nearly 200 extra patients a week during the height of a flu pandemic.

The outbreak of flu cases in England and Wales looks like it has peaked, experts say.

The UK is named as one of Europe's worst countries for measles, dashing global hopes of eradicating the disease by 2010.

An advert for a cold and flu medicine is criticised by bosses for encouraging workers to "throw a sickie".

All new homes should be fitted with measures to prevent the build-up of the potentially harmful gas radon, say researchers.

Skin cancer patients have a higher chance of developing other forms of the disease, research suggests.

Chinese authorities shut down and clean poultry markets in Hebei province, after the first human death in nearly a year.

More people need to donate their brains to medical research if cures for diseases like dementia are to be found, scientists say.

An intensive care room reopens to new admissions after a bug affected a hospital's neo-natal ward.

Playing the computer puzzle game Tetris might help reduce the effects of traumatic stress, say UK researchers.

AP - Mississippi now has the nation's highest teen pregnancy rate, displacing Texas and New Mexico for that lamentable title, according to a new federal report released Wednesday.

AP - Millions of children and adults have seizures in the United States, but dying from one is rare. That only adds to the confusion and mystery surrounding the life and death of Jett Travolta, the 16-year-old son of actors John Travolta and Kelly Preston.

AP - Parkinson's sufferers who had electrodes implanted in their brains improved substantially more than those who took only medicine, according to the biggest test yet of deep brain stimulation. The study, which followed patients for six months, offers the most hopeful news to date for Parkinson's sufferers. The new technique reduced tremors, rigidity and flailing of the limbs and allowed people to move freely for nearly five extra hours a day.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama's reported choice for surgeon general, CNN medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta, could bring a dose of star power to a job that hasn't had that much clout in decades.

AP - Health care continued to take up a greater share of the economy in 2007, as spending on hospitals, doctors and other services increased 6.1 percent to $2.2 trillion.

Reuters - U.S. researchers may have found an obesity treatment that unlocks the fat-fighting promise of leptin, an appetite-suppressing hormone once hailed as the answer to the battle of the bulge.

HealthDay - MONDAY, Jan. 5 (HealthDay News) -- Tests in mouse hearts show that sildenafil, the key ingredient in Viagra, may shield hearts from damage caused by high blood pressure, a new study suggests.

HealthDay - MONDAY, Jan. 5 (HealthDay News) -- More than half of teens who use the social networking site MySpace have posted information about sexual behavior, substance abuse or violence, new research shows.

HealthDay - (HealthDay News) -- Many children suck their thumbs, but it can cause dental problems if children continue to suck their thumb beyond age 4.

HealthDay - WEDNESDAY, Jan. 7 (HealthDay News) --- Seniors who head south each winter to escape the cold often feel better just thinking about the warmer climes.

WASHINGTON (MedPage Today) -- Sanjay Gupta, M.D., the Emory neurosurgeon who doubles as CNN's chief medical correspondent, has been offered the post of surgeon general in the Obama administration, according to the Washington Post.

WASHINGTON (MedPage Today) -- The ailing economy is leaving older Americans fretting about how to pay for healthcare costs in the upcoming year, according to an AARP-sponsored survey.

ROCKVILLE (MedPage Today) -- The FDA's advisory committee on neurology drugs will decide this week whether to recommend approval of an investigational anti-seizure drug known to cause irreversible vision loss in a significant fraction of patients.

COPENHAGEN (MedPage Today) -- Measles persists in Europe despite more than two decades of routine childhood vaccination programs, researchers here said.

ROCHESTER, Minn. (MedPage Today) -- Choosing the most promising approach to achieve amenorrhea for excessive or prolonged menstrual bleeding can rest on a host of patient factors, said researchers here.

LEXINGTON, Ky. (MedPage Today) -- Grape seed extract may induce human leukemia cell death by activating specific proteins involved in apoptosis, researchers here said.

NEW SOUTH WALES, Australia (MedPage Today) -- Kids -- especially girls -- who spend more time doing activities such as e-mailing, texting, watching TV, and playing video games tend to be less fit, researchers here reported.

ZURICH, Switzerland (MedPage Today) -- A whiff of oxytocin can help spur the recognition of faces as familiar but can't do the same for memories of inanimate things, researchers here said.

HINES, Ill. (MedPage Today) -- Deep brain stimulation was more effective in improving Parkinson's disease symptoms than "best medical therapy" in a large randomized trial, but was also associated with more adverse effects, said researchers here.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (MedPage Today) -- Implantable cardioverter defibrillators reduce mortality in even the oldest, sickest patients, a real-world primary prevention study showed.

Playing outdoors dramatically cuts a child's risk of becoming short-sighted, research shows.

Many of us have the daily struggle of putting a name to a familiar face. Now scientists have discovered that a natural 'love drug' in the brain is the reason some people are better at recognising faces than others.

Hopes of banishing measles from Europe by 2010 may have been dashed by poor vaccination rates in a handful of countries including Britain, researchers claim.

The number of people diagnosed with diabetes has soared by 50 per cent in just a year.

A baby has died and seven others are in an isolation ward after the outbreak of a bug in a hospital neo-natal unit. The child was one of two premature babies found to be infected.

For Clare Bowen, the single parent of two boys, this Christmas has been particularly bleak. For in the space of about two years, she lost first her eldest child, Bethany, at the age of five, and then, 11 months ago, her husband, Richard.

Bosses are furious over a TV commercial for a cold remedy which encourages sufferers 'to throw a sickie'.

A drug used to treat acne and prostate disease may help sufferers of nasal polyps. This is one of several new non-invasive treatments for the condition, which affects an estimated 1 million Britons.

Patients with the flu as well as doctors will be told to wear face masks under the first guidance of its kind ever issued to GPs

Medical experts want more people to leave their brains to science. They said a severe shortage is blocking vital research into Alzheimer's and other incurable diseases. Thousands more are needed.